UN Backs Equal Earth Map to Show Africa’s True Size
The United Nations General Assembly has overwhelmingly backed the wider use of the Equal Earth map projection, which depicts continents according to their relative surface areas and corrects distortions that have long made Africa appear significantly smaller than it actually is.
UN Backs Equal Earth World Map
The “Correct the Map” resolution was supported by 164 countries on September 4, with six abstentions. The United States was the only country to vote against the measure.
Spearheaded by Togo and supported by African states, the resolution encourages governments, educational institutions, international organisations and other users of maps to consider projections that provide a more accurate representation of the relative sizes of the world’s landmasses.
Why Mercator Maps Make Africa Look Smaller
The widely recognised Mercator projection was developed by Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569 primarily for navigation. While useful for preserving directions and angles, it substantially distorts landmass sizes as locations move farther from the equator.
As a result, Europe, North America and Greenland appear disproportionately large, while Africa and South America appear smaller. Greenland, for example, can appear roughly comparable to Africa on a Mercator map despite Africa having about 14 times its land area.
Equal Earth Projection Preserves Relative Area
Developed by cartographers in 2018, the Equal Earth projection is designed to preserve the relative surface areas of continents while maintaining recognisable shapes.
The UN resolution does not ban the Mercator projection, which remains useful for navigation. Instead, it encourages broader adoption of Equal Earth for education, communication and other settings where comparative landmass size matters.
The United States opposed the resolution, arguing that the UN should focus on more pressing global issues. Supporters said correcting distorted geographic representations could improve public understanding of Africa’s true scale.
